Let’s face it…we are all trying to find a way to stay within our budgets, exceed goals and advance to what’s next, all with a particular (usually limited) amount of resources, right? So, trying to cut corners and take advantage of discounts, deals or promotions is pretty wise. But, when does this taking advantage approach turn into down right negligence?

It turns into this when you start trying to get over, get on or get the hook up at the expense of your friends and family and their goals. For example, think about your friends who are small business owners. Do they provide a product or service or manage a place that you frequent? Is your first question every single time you stop by their establishment, “can I get a discount on this” or “come on, I know you can do something”?

You absolutely should try to stretch your dollar and make it go as far as it can, but I’m suggesting that you genuinely and whole heartedly support people – especially friends and family – without always peaking through the lens of “what’s in this for me“?

Supporting someone does not always have to come in the form of a monetary exchange. There are surely other ways to show your appreciation and support of someone, including:

Sending someone an article that has content that they would interested in

Calling (actually picking up the phone and dialing numbers – not texting) someone just to say hello

At work, let a colleagues’ superior know they do an outstanding job

Encourage someone to try something you know they want to try, but haven’t yet because they’re scared, and offer to try it with them

Scarlet Says…no one wants to feel like their relationship with someone is solely based on their ability to provide a “hook up”. Take the time – when you are not in need – to show the people around you that you are grateful for them, so when you actually do need something, making the ask will be appropriate and not awkward.

As a treat to our Scarlet supporters and readers, I’d like to pay it forward to you. You now have an opportunity to try out your first Hello Fresh box at a deeply discounted rate. Hello Fresh provides weekly deliveries of farm fresh ingredients and delicious recipes to your doorstep and is a dinner party partner to Scarlet. Visit their website and use the promotional code, Scarlet35, towards your first box. Consider this our way of paying it forward! Happy Eating!

Until Next Time,

Scarlet

14

Mar 16

About 4 years ago, we were in the market for a travel agent to assist with planning our wedding in Mexico. Although I’ve had a significant amount of experience in wedding planning, doing so internationally wasn’t quite my thing, so I knew that I needed an experienced travel agent. With all of the do it yourself options online nowadays, coming across an experienced and dedicated travel agent seemed almost impossible.

I recall that some dear friends of ours, the now married coupled, Mack and Linda Ornsby Hendricks, had just hosted a beautiful wedding in Costa Rica, so I reached out to see if they had used anyone to assist, and luckily they did. Now, at a first pass, I’ll admit, I was skeptical. Brenda has an email address that ends in comcast.net, which always makes me a bit eerie. I always expect that in business, a company or person should have a non-public domain name, but I digress. I pushed that piece of information to the side and took the recommendation at face value and reached out to her and I’m so happy that I did.

This is where the, now 4 year relationship, with our travel agent began. Mack and Linda referred us to a woman named Brenda Stock, who has been our consistent, reliable and dedicated travel agent since we’ve met her. While I take recommendations from my friends seriously, Brenda has surpassed the recommendation and went above and beyond proving that she is a highly qualified resource. She has even planned trips for my friends and family because of our recommendations. I was recently doing a brief tally in my head of how many trips she has planned for us or from a recommendation from us and that number is quite impressive.

But why? What has made Brenda’s service so outstanding and even caused me to push some usually, baseline business basics to the side. It really boils down to 4 things:

Consistence

Responsiveness

Professionalism

Industry Knowledge

Over the past 4 years, every encounter with Brenda has had the 4 components above. Unlike many professionals, who get used to your business, then begin to be a bit more lax in their responsiveness or professionalism, this is not the case for Brenda. The even more ironic and partially amazing things about this business relationship is that I’ve never physically met Brenda before; all of our encounters have been either via phone or email, which is completely against how I prefer to do business. Brenda gives her perspective of industry specifics and recommendations and she consistently meets or exceeds our expectations. In an industry where most people take to the Internet to “self serve” their travel needs, it’s nice to have a reliable professional who consistently exceeds expectations and does so with professionalism, industry knowledge and impeccable response time.

Scarlet Says… Customer Service has one key word that should be kept in mind – “customer”. The success or demise of a business is strongly indicative of how the customer is treated. If you want your business to succeed and thrive, take special care in how you treat your biggest asset – your customer.

Until next time,

Scarlet

Want to learn more about Customer Service Etiquette and how it can enhance your organization, just click HERE!